Even as it championed midwives in a recent piece, the New York Times editorial board unwittingly slipped into language that suggests midwifery care is a second-tier option—language that reflects broader public attitudes throughout the United States.

From a 21-year-old who first saw the need for sex ed when he was the only out gay man at his Catholic school in Louisiana, to the 27-year-old web editor of one of the most popular love and relationship sites in India, these young activists are leading local sexual and reproductive health and rights movements around the world.

Referring to vaginal birth as “natural” isn’t just troubling because it is imprecise; it also contributes to a value-laden judgment of mothers’ experiences that can lead to compromised emotional and physical health.

A new report from Choices in Childbirth adds to a body of evidence that doula care should be included in health plans and made available to all women, particularly women of color, who face disproportionate rates of maternal and infant mortality in the United States.

A coalition of reproductive and racial justice advocates are demanding better standards of care for the 500 or so pregnant Texans—most whom are Black and Latina—incarcerated in Texas county jails each month.

Many of the employers suing the federal government over the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive benefit, including Wheaton College in Illinois, fail to offer employees robust parental leave coverage, an analysis by RH Reality Check shows.

The stories of women who participated in focus groups led by SisterSong, included in a new report, convey the gross under-education and discriminatory treatment of Black women living in the South, in particular, where sexual and reproductive health education is nonexistent and stigma is rampant.

Women should be free to choose their childbirth experience, whether it be in a hospital or in the woods. But I fear that Born in the Wild will be a disingenuous attempt to suggest that modern medicine ruined childbirth.

Currently, in Delaware, it’s effectively illegal for a trained, certified midwife to attend a home birth. A new bill introduced in the state legislature last week aims to change that, and is one example of how a growing movement of midwives is seeking to change inconsistent state laws that often criminalize their practice.

Birth Ambassadors: Doulas and the Re-Emergence of Woman-Supported Birth in America by Christine H. Morton and Elayne G. Clift is a detailed look at childbirth practices that zeroes in on the difficult and sometimes contradictory roles played by members of hospital labor-and-delivery teams.